A TO Z
Idea 5: Open Data Is the Fuel for a Cognitive Surplus in a ‘Smarter City’
Clay Shirky has developed the great idea of cognitive surplus, which talks about people learning how to use their free time more constructively. My suggestion is that open data is a new resource that can amplify the impact of this trend. In any city, you will find a huge amount of intellectual capability inherent in its citizens. These citizens know first-hand the issues and the opportunities of the city and by using open data they can rapidly create tools (apps) and insights to make their lives better in some way. I would not be surprised that if we could add up the collective processing power of citizens in many cities, it would exceed the combined processing power in all the cities’ industries and government agencies—this computing power is not only in the form of laptops, smartphones and most importantly in the heads of its citizens, but increasingly it is in the cloud-based solutions that are being used. Therefore, feeding open data to this cognitive surplus enables systems within cities to operate better at almost no increase in cost. To be able to reveal large amounts of hitherto unseen open data, i.e. the dark matter, it takes some careful data regulation to ensure quality and accessibility. Often it is about keeping data formats simple (Simple Data Format, SDF) and creating open APIs (Application Programming Interfaces). In conclusion, my contention is that, like dark matter, open data is a lot bigger than we think.
Ian Abbott-Donnelly works as a European CTO for IBM ‘Big Green Innovations’ & Smarter Cities. Ian’s current areas of focus in IBM are advanced water management, smarter cities and computing applied to environmental issues.
113